I can't seem to find a middle ground where treats are concerned. I don't starve myself while I diet. I eat good amounts of food. Not "nothing" as far as food goes. I eat a lot of healthy foods, prepared myself, all that jazz.
It's the cakes, cookies, pies, tarts, ice cream, etc. If I make ice cream, I eat like a pint a day. I don't eat a piece of cake. I eat all the cake in two or three days. I start eating the cookies before I even get them frosted and can easily eat a dozen big ones in a day. Heck, I start eating stuff before it's baked - I lick the paddle and get the bits of batter left in the bowl as soon as I pop it in the oven.
I just cannot seem to find a middle ground on these items, so I deprive myself of them. I don't make anything - and baking is probably my favorite thing to do.
If you had this problem and conquered it, what was your strategy, thought process or whatever?
I can skip them entirely. It's not like I MUST eat them. No addiction problem. I just eat and eat them up when I make them and I disappoint myself.
Any tips are welcome!
Last edited by Stripes 237; 04-09-2015 at 05:47 PM.
I wish I could offer you some advice, but I'm the same way. I, too, love baking, but I have a major sweet tooth. If it's in the house, I will polish it off in short order. I hate that I am that way. The funny thing is that if I were out and I bought a nice-sized piece of cake and had it with a cup of coffee, I would be completely satisfied and not go looking for anything else, but if I baked a cake, it would plague me until I had eaten most of it in a short period of time.
I wish I could offer you some advice, but I'm the same way. I, too, love baking, but I have a major sweet tooth. If it's in the house, I will polish it off in short order. I hate that I am that way. The funny thing is that if I were out and I bought a nice-sized piece of cake and had it with a cup of coffee, I would be completely satisfied and not go looking for anything else, but if I baked a cake, it would plague me until I had eaten most of it in a short period of time.
What the heck is wrong with us? I have a close friend who is the same way - she can resist, but once she starts, it's a free-for-all. What is our problem?
Cake from out is usually not as good, lol, but I get you.
I know most of the world can eat a piece of cake and stop for the day. I must learn to do this. But so far, it's not working out. I'm losing! I just don't make treats!
I hear ya ladies LOUD AND STRONG probably the reason why I've been a member here for 13 YEARS because I yo-yo, I'm an either all-or-nothing person also.
I also love sweets!..the ONLY way I can not binge on them at home, is for them not to be here And being that I am a pastry chef, it kinda sucks because I can make something delicious out of basics and have it ready pretty quickly.
Last edited by VermontMom; 04-09-2015 at 07:19 PM.
I just cannot seem to find a middle ground on these items, so I deprive myself of them. ...
I can skip them entirely. It's not like I MUST eat them. No addiction problem. I just eat and eat them up when I make them and I disappoint myself.
Any tips are welcome!
The "all or nothing" phenomenon is a direct result of the "good and bad" food associations. If baked goods are your weakness, then you've probably scolded yourself about eating them. You've probably deprived yourself of these foods and then felt guilt after eating them. There are a lot of super charged emotions and judgments around these foods. This is often the key to yoyo dieting and binging. When you deprive yourself of something you want it more. You stop listening to what your body wants and you start imposing external rules about what it should or shouldn't eat. So you say "no no no, you can't have ANY sweets." This way your body starts to mistrust you and then when it finally gets the chance to eat cake it doesn't stop until there is no more left... because your body/mind know that tomorrow you'll put these foods back on the restriction list again so it goes in for all or nothing.
For me the key has been to eliminate the negative feelings around foods. First, I don't deprive myself of them. I am not a bad person if I eat cookies, and neither am I a good person if I abstain from them. It takes a while to get rid of that mentality and make no self judgements for eating. Food is food and it can't hurt me or benefit me unless I eat it in large portions. Then I honor my cravings, just like lin suggested - go out and get yourself a nice muffin or brownie or ice cream cone or whatever it is that you like to have. Sit and eat it mindfully enjoying every bite. Make it an event, don't scarf it down in less than a minute. Enjoy the full experience of eating it - the experience is so satisfying to your body and mind that it doesn't turn you into a lunatic looking for your next sugar fix.
People really undervalue the benefits of moderation. Moderation can be achieved when you get rid of the underlying guilt of enjoying food and simply take the time to fully enjoy the food you eat.
PS - there's nothing wrong with keeping sugary foods out of the house, but it may not be the right thing to do if it's causing you to binge on these foods when they are around. Abstinence does not mean you have a healthy relationship with this food.
Last edited by Palestrina; 04-10-2015 at 08:40 AM.
I come from years of practicing abstinence from sugar and cheese through the program of Overeaters Annonymous. I got a point recently where I didn't want to have to abstain from foods and go to meetings around foods. I wanted to have a bigger life than that. I have gained weight, 7 lbs as of today, since reintroducing sugar to my diet (I had been eating cheese again for a few years already). I had been struggling to maintain my weight even while abstaining from sugar due to afternoon binges on high fat foods.
I came into this new phase wanting to do just what Palestrina describes above...change my head around "forbidden" or "binge" foods and be able to have a different relationship to food. It hasn't happened yet, despite my reading a whole ton of intuitive eating books. Somehow, my head just can't figure this all out on it's own. I had a therapist who wasn't helping much in the eating realm, so I let that go. But now here I am out in the world, eating 6 cups of kettle corn...eating 4 quesadillas...and feeling very out of control to stop it.
I do have hope that I can change this, but I feel so impatient and dogmatic about what size I want to be at the same time. It's a difficult and confusing place to be. For me, all or nothing has been the only perspective that has made sense and worked, but I have hope that there is another way.
Right now I like the book End Emotional Eating by Jennifer Taitz. I'm hoping a friend of mine will want to do a book study with me on it. It is compatible with intuitive eating perspectives, it seems.
To be continued. One thing I have promised myself and feel strong in is that I will never give up in my quest for a sane relationship with food.
Best wishes, Lin, Stripes and Holly, and thanks for the perspective, Palestrina. This is a great topic and one that is very close to home for me.
Palestrina, I get what you're saying, but I'm not sure it applies to all. Even when I have said "to he** with it" and eaten to my heart's content, not worrying about my weight, the lure of sweets never diminished. In fact, the more I eat of them, the more I want them. I notice that when I don't eat sweets even for a week, my desire for them diminishes (because I don't have them around). Also, I am not generally one to label foods "good" and "bad" and I eschew "diet" food, but the fact is that sugar really isn't good for us. I don't have the statistics on hand, but I have read in more than one place that we eat several times the amount of sugar that people did even 50 years ago. Sugar is not a food that is neutral in terms of health.
Georgette, your post really resonated with me, particularly,
Quote:
Originally Posted by Georgette
I do have hope that I can change this, but I feel so impatient and dogmatic about what size I want to be at the same time
Yes! Sorry, but I cannot let go of the fact that I DON'T WANT TO BE FAT. That's it. Call it vanity, superficial, etc., but there it is. I have not reached the point where I am so sick of restricting that I am willing to be fat to stop doing it. There are some sacrifices I won't make (e.g., I'm not willing to be rigid with my diet), but I have do watch somewhat because if I do not, I WILL gain. It has happened in the past and it will happen again unless I'm on top of it.
One thing that has helped me is to plan a treat every day. While I am trying to eat very healthy, and lose weight, I plan to eat one ice cream bar every day. I do not get a pint of ice cream (I will eat it all). But one ice cream bar, does well for me. Then I do not feel like I am depriving myself, but I have a treat in moderation. It really helps me that the ice cream bars are portioned out, and in the freezer where I can't see them.
I'm not claiming that it's easy. I don't restrict sugar but that doesn't mean that I'm eating sugar all day long or even every day. The decision to keep sugar to a minimum comes from an internal source of discontent with how I feel when I eat sugar. It makes me lethargic, bloated, and yes it makes me crave more sugar and more food in general. I hate feeling that way! I sometimes fall into little sugar traps but I get out of them quicker each time by paying attention to how the sugar makes my body feel and responding to its desire to feel better than that. It's not Perfect science but restriction makes me binge undeniably Everytime I do it.
My problem is that I don't experience any discomfort or lethargy when I overeat sugar, starch, or anything else, so there's no physical price to pay except weight gain. As I've mentioned elsewhere, I seem to have a very strong digestive system and never experience digestive symptoms of any kind unless I have a stomach bug, which may happen once every decade. Perhaps I've just lost sensitivity to my discomfort cues. I don't know.
I am very much on the stop and enjoy every bit of a portion person. I also avoid going straight for sugar/sweet/salt (aka the food addiction trifecta) before eating a meal. If I'm hungry and eat chips or dessert or takeout first, I will eat a ton more than what is satisfying, simply because it's available.
Before I could employ the above technique 90-95% effectively, I had to retrain myself on how to listen to my hunger cues. That meant that I planned breakfast/snack/lunch/snack/dinner and ate those items as I noticed myself feeling hungry and tune in and slow down as hungry gave way to satiated, full, or not hungry. It takes a lot of practice to get better at this, to be able to differentiate between a trigger (commercial/time of day/seeing a food/feeling) and actual hunger, but it is absolutely magnificent over time.
A final tip is to consider a single-serving or half recipe. Built in control as you build up your habits, you know? And if there are desserts that freeze well, either pre- or post-baking, freezing single portions helps slow down the rapid fire consumption. Especially if you practice only preparing a single portion at a time.
I'm with Georgette and Lin on this. I can go for a year or more without sugar and lose about a pound a week while doing it, then the minute I let sugar back into my life my weight soars. Most recently I had been off sugar for eight months and lost about 45 pounds, then, the middle of January this year, I decided to allow myself some fudge and I've been on a sugar binge ever since, gaining 35 pounds.
I'm sure there are many psychological reasons, but there are some physical ones, too. Sugar does cause your pancreas to produce large amounts of insulin and that in turn causes hunger. Blood sugar spikes then drops and the quickest cure for the drop is to eat more sugar. And of course nothing tastes quite as good.
It's depressing to think that I may have to make up my mind to never eat sugar again but I believe that may be my only choice if I don't want to end up a 400lb woman with serious health problems. I remind myself that people led happy lives without sugar for thousands of years.
For me, it just depends. There are certain foods (cookies, for example) that I just don't buy for the house since I find it hard to limit how much I eat. On the other hand, I take 5 days to slowly eat a bar of dark chocolate. So, the dark chocolate is OK for me, but I only eat cookies away from the house where it is limited quantity.
The only thing I find that it is easier for me to eliminate entirely is soft drinks with artificial sweetener. They are really out of sight, out of mind.
There are certain foods (cookies, for example) that I just don't buy for the house since I find it hard to limit how much I eat. On the other hand, I take 5 days to slowly eat a bar of dark chocolate. So, the dark chocolate is OK for me, but I only eat cookies away from the house where it is limited quantity
Same for me. I think it may be because dark chocolate does not have the same high sugar content as nearly all cookies do. Also, just speaking for myself, I am not a chocoholic (more into desserts w/ fruits & nuts), so chocolate does not present the temptation that other sweets do.
Same with me, Lin. It's odd that fudge would have been my breaker the last time because it doesn't compare with ice-cream, cookies, cake, pie or pudding as a major source of temptation for me. I think what happened was that the fudge was in the house for a very long time while those other things I only had to resist for a few days around Christmas.
I've found that If I'm off sugar, my husband can have all the candy he enjoys, on a high shelf of his own and I can forget about it. The things I mentioned don't thrill him much so I don't feel like a big meanie, not having them around.
All Or Nothing - Have you conquered it?
probably the reason why I've been a member here for 13 YEARS because I yo-yo, I'm an either all-or-nothing person also.
And being that I am a pastry chef, it kinda sucks 
because I can make something delicious out of basics and have it ready pretty quickly.
